


Searching

by GingerLocks



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Friendship is Magic, Kidnapping, Sam Wilson is a Gift, Timeline What Timeline, what even is Ultron?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-28
Updated: 2015-03-26
Packaged: 2018-03-15 15:26:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3452225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GingerLocks/pseuds/GingerLocks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How Steve met Darcy, and how they stick together even when tragedy strikes.</p><p>*"How will it get better?” He asked, as he wrapped his arms closer around her.<br/>“It will get better, because we will get better. We will be stronger, and we won’t stop fighting, won’t stop looking.”<br/>“We will never stop hoping,” he nodded.<br/>“Yes.” Darcy leaned her head back onto his shoulder, wrapping her arms over his, so they both embraced her scarred abdomen.*</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. before things got dark

**Author's Note:**

  * For [McGregorsWench](https://archiveofourown.org/users/McGregorsWench/gifts), [Who is amazing and did a wonderful job of arranging this fic exchange!](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Who+is+amazing+and+did+a+wonderful+job+of+arranging+this+fic+exchange%21).



> AN  
> This was first intended to be a 3k fic for my Valentines Day exchange... but over 10k later, here I am and I hope you're okay with taking this journey. 
> 
> I have taken some HUGE liberties with the different timelines (like Agents of SHIELD/the impact of Darcy’s presence in Captain America’s universe (not just Thor’s). Mixing everything together just made a mess in my brain. I also made a mess of stuff bc I suck at timelines.  
> I have also taken liberties with some background stories- specifically Darcy, a little for Sam, and Natasha, and Bucky. Other than that, I have tried to keep it as close to canon as possible.  
> Trigger warning: Kidnapping

 

“On your left,” Steve mumbled, as he saw Sam sitting in the chair next to his hospital bed. _He pulled me out of the Potomac. Bucky. He saved me. I was almost dead. I could not fight him… Darcy’s gonna kill me._

Sam snorted at his lame attempt at humour. “You’re damned right,” he smiled slightly.

“Nah, man, I just told you. I’m on your left.”

Instead of Sam making a comment about Darcy’s bad influence, as he usually did when Steve made a lame joke, Sam just heaved a heavy sigh.

Steve smiled. Darcy was the best damned thing that had ever happened to him. He sighed too, and closed his eyes. He was too tired to keep them open for too long, letting thoughts of his favourite person in the world distract him from the pain of the beating his second favourite had given him.

He had met Sam almost two years ago. They’d met first while running round the Smithsonian early in the morning. He couldn’t resist the urge to say “ _on your left_ ” every time he passed him, which, when they took the same route, was an average of five times per lap. For some reason, Sam had intrigued him. Something about him was so damned familiar, and drew him in. After just one conversation, he realised why. They had both been in the trenches.

So maybe the trenches had been a few decades apart, and in vastly different scenery, and with (and against) different weapons and enemies... but they both felt it, and they both _knew._

_*_

_“You have trouble sleeping, too?”_

_“Yeah, the bed… it’s too soft.”_

_“Damned straight! Try sleeping on the floor for a while, then the sofa, and then the bed. Though the best option would be to get someone to hold, and just stay in the bed.”_

_“I left my dame in ’45. Now she only remembers me half the time.”_

_“There is no shame in getting a new one.”_

_“Easier said than done!”¨_

_“Don’t I know it!”_

_*_

And they had both lost their best friend in action.

Steve had started doing more than just running with Sam. At first, he would join him for breakfast after their run, and then he showed up to his office after his group grief counselling sessions, and then he had used him as an excuse when Natasha tried to set him up with _Susan from HR_ and he’d said he was ‘ _planning on watching a game with a friend_.’ And Natasha was not one to lie to, so he had every intention of seeing a baseball game with Sam, only to have it turned into a basketball game. Not that he minded. Baseball mostly just reminded him of Bucky, and how he had wanted to be a pitcher for the Dodgers.

It wasn’t until Sam invited him for Thanksgiving that Steve realised how much time they had started spending together, and how he felt much more alive than he did hiding away in Brooklyn the previous year. And although he had to skip Thanksgiving to help Natasha save Clint’s ass from his Russian mob troubles, he was still invited over for Christmas.

*

_“You’ll get to meet the whole family.”_

_“Family? I thought you only had that weird uncle, Albert?”_

_“Steve, my man, just because my family is gone, doesn’t mean I can’t get a new one.”_

_*_

And so he had met Sam’s _‘family’_. He’d met Patty, the receptionist at the youth center where Sam volunteered, with her multiple piercings and hot pink hair. And he met Gary, Patty’s boyfriend who was twice her age, but looked so much younger... with his soft everything, and pastel sweater vests, and glasses that were always slightly askew. And little Sophie who had run away from home to join the circus at just 13 and was now, six years later, a shady little kid that could both get into bars without being carded, and join a children’s party at Chuck E. Cheese’s for free pizza without being questioned. And her little kid, Oliver, who was just three years old, and who everybody spoiled like crazy, despite her insisting that he needed to learn from an early age how tough the world was.

And, he met Darcy, the mother hen who would roll her eyes at Patty’s tough-chick act, and Gary’s screams when Oliver proudly presented the spider he had hunted down. Darcy, who made Sophie smile and accept the love she was not used to receiving, and made cookies just for Sam because he mentioned years ago that he loved gingerbread with chocolate chips.

Darcy, who took one look at him, cracked a joke, and discretely managed to get him alone in the kitchen under the guise of needing to grill him on his Christmas favorites away from the craziness, and asked him how Thor was doing. Then, whisper-yelled at him, demanding to know _why in the hell_ Thor hadn’t bothered to visit Jane, after making SHIELD place them in Tromsø during the summer.

*

“ _It’s like Alaska, Steve! I swear, I barely slept because the sun never went away! Midnight sun, Steve, let me tell you. It really fucks up your sleeping habits! Anyway, Thor should have at least called! So, next time you see him? Please, please, ask him to call Jane before rainbow-roading out of Midgard! Also, what did you used to have for Christmas dinner when you were growing up during the Great Depression?”_

_*_

The fact that Darcy not only knew about SHIELD, but had actually been in the middle of an attack by Loki herself... and apparently knew how to cook five different meals in a crappy kitchen in shorter time than he and Sam had made pizzas that one time from scratch, was probably what first drew him to her. And, of course, it didn’t hurt that she was incredibly beautiful, witty, and funny... and treated him like any other 27-year-old. She even helped him get through most of his ‘ _list_ ’, explaining easy pop-culture references, and downloading movies to a laptop she helped him pick out.

*

_“Do not underestimate my pop-culture knowledge, nor modern-life hacks! Or I’ll leave you to fumble on your own, and take away your Pop-Tarts.”_

_“Aye, aye, Captain.”_

_“I can’t hear you!”_

_“Erm, aye, aye, Captain!?”_

_“Whoooo lives in a pineapple under the sea?”_

_“… what?”_

_“I’ll give you a crash course on SpongeBob tomorrow morning. Actually, I can get Oliver to do it for me.”_

_*_

He definitely knew he was a goner when she invited herself to the SHIELD annual New Year’s Eve party as his and Sam’s plus-one; telling him that they owed her after the Tromsø incident, and something about a stolen iPod... She showed up in a dress that hugged her curves in all the right places, and then proceeded to dance with Clint, whom she’d met in New Mexico, and knew he’d had his brain fried the same way as ‘ _her Erik’_ by Loki.

*

_“I was going to come over here to set you up with Tina from Reception, but I can see that your type is clearly brunette and curvy with connections to England.”_

_“Ha! Thanks, Natasha. Why don’t you take a crack at Sam? He’s been single longer than I have.”_

_“I was going to crack a joke about your seven decades of being single, but this new victim seems promising. Why don’t you tell me about him?”_

_*_

He’d been sad to see Darcy go. She had to get back to Jane and Erik in London the following Wednesday, and he offered to drive her to the airport. She showed up at his apartment an hour before he was going to get her, bags packed.  She demanded that he add her on Skype, and promiseto visit the next time SHIELD sent him to Europe. Then, she spent the rest of her hour there making him a Skype account, adding herself, and then going through the first episode of a show called “Game of Thrones,” and had given him a huge set of books that he had to promise to read before he met her again.

When they settled into the car he’d rented just so he could be the one to take her to the airport, she hadn’t commented, knowing full well that she would have done the same had the positions been  reversed.

But, when he awkwardly tried to give her a hug goodbye, she just rolled her eyes, muttered something about having to do everything herself, and gave his collar a tug until his face was on level with hers. Then, she smirked at his dumbfounded expression before she brought her lips to his. And it was heaven... being kissed by Darcy, kissing Darcy, holding Darcy close in his embrace while they kissed.

And then she had left him there, face red with the mixture of her lipstick and his blush from when she whispered what she wanted to do to him the next time they met.

He immediately went home to read the entire “a Song of Ice and Fire,” because he promised he would before he saw her again, and he wanted to see her soon.

If Sam hadn’t been so preoccupied with Natasha trying to set him up, while he tried not to let Natasha know just how hard he was falling for her, then Steve would have probably been given a whole lot of shit about how shitty he was in Darcy’s absence.

In the end though, Natasha pulled up in one of her many luxurious sports cars and told him to suit up before she dropped him in a field outside Glasgow with a bag, a note, and a train ticket to London where he was staying in a 5-star hotel. Steve was halfway caught between excitement at the prospect of meeting Darcy again, and annoyance that Natasha had dropped him off in full Captain America gear, with the shield and everything, in the wrong damn country.

Excitement won out.

So, he called Darcy, casually asking her about what sort of plans she had that week. The expression on her face when she found him leaning against her apartment door was almost as good as the greeting she gave him. Actually, it was not even close.

He stayed in London for almost a month before Natasha whisked him away on another damned mission, the worst of his new life. Almost two months undercover with no way of contacting the woman he either spent time with 24/7 or called/skyped/texted at least 5 times a day.

But, the worst was when the mission was over and the bad guys put away, and he returned to London because he had promised Darcy that he would. He was met by news headlines of the alien invasion that happened a few days prior, and reports of Thor sightings during the fight and on the Underground.

He ran all the way from the station to the tiny apartment she shared with the tiny Jane, and was greeted by Erik, sans pants, telling him that Darcy was at the hospital. And as he was shaking the poor, mentally-unstable scientist and calling Darcy for the fifth time in as many minutes, the front door opened, and Darcy came in with a skinny man with his arm in a sling.

She had obviously been in the hospital to either pick up this man, or get him that sling. The pure relief of that conclusion washed over Steve.

She was alive, she was whole, and she was mad. He quickly let Erik go in favor of picking her up and kissing her like his life depended on it.

And after a yelling match between them about her risking her life throwing shoes into portals, and running around London with Jane’s science sticks, and her being an adult and able to make her own damned decisions... and a lot of make-up making out... (All in the tiny apartment as Erik and Ian pretended not to notice,) Steve finally manned up and asked her to move in with him.

*

_“What?”_

_“You heard me. Move in with me. After you are done with this internship in a few weeks, and you finally graduate Culver, I will attend your graduation with Sam and that gang, and Jane, Erik, Nat, Clint, and even that skinny guy over there-“_

_“Ian?”_

_“Ian, and Thor, if he is here still. We’ll all be there as you get your diploma, and then we will eat at a nice restaurant, and then the kids will go to bed as we get roaring drunk. Well, as the people not genetically-engineered get roaring drunk. And then I will take you home, and you will stay there with me in my apartment, and we will make it your apartment, too, because I do not think I can go on just texting and calling and Skyping after the incredible weeks I had with you here. The last two months were bad enough-“_

_“Steve! Sweetie, breathe!”_

_“Sorry, I just, I love you. I really do. And I just thought I’d lost you, and it’s okay if you want to take it slow, and I can understand if you don’t-“_

_“Steve, as adorable as it is when you’re the one babbling for a change, it is kind of hard to accept your offer and tell you I love you, too, when you won’t shut up.”_

_“Starting to see things from my point of view, are you?”_

_“Oh, you shut up! You love it when I talk.”_

_“I know that you know I love it when you do.”_

_“…That was supposed to be smooth wasn’t it?”_

_“Yes.”_

_“Don’t sweat it. Living with me will make you the smoothest motherfucker in no time.”_

*

They lived together for only two glorious months before Darcy proposed to him, in bed, mid-orgasm, and he said yes without even thinking anything other than; _yes, Darcy I love you._

Sam thought they were the cutest pair as they got married three months later in an office in Brooklyn, Steve in jeans (since he lost a bet to his beautiful girl), and Darcy in her nice red dress that Pepper had gotten her at the last minute. (Her white one hadn’t fit her over her chest that morning.)

*

_“Good morning, Husband.”_

_“Good morning, Wife.”_

_“I’ve been awake for a while now. Have I ever told you that you sleep like the dead?”_

_“Yes. On multiple occasions! The last time was yesterday when I almost overslept on my own wedding day.”_

_“You did look hot in jeans and with bed-head, though…”_

_“...and you were telling me about what you were thinking about as I woke this morning, so you should get to the point before I ravish you again...”_

_“Good point. So, I was just thinking... you know that stomach flu I had a few days ago, and the airplane sickness from DC to NYC? And how my boobs are getting bigger than they’ve ever been?”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“Well, my stomach is getting bigger too.”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“I think I’m pregnant, Steve.”_

_“…”_

_“Steve?”_

_“You’re pregnant?”_

_“I think I might be... yes.”_

_“Really?”_

_“You’re not mad?”_

_“No? I- I just- I’m happy? But, I also, there is the ‘risking-my-life-all-the-time’, and the paranoia that you’re never safe enough, and I just- I-“_

_“No, Steve! Sweetie, don’t cry! You’ll make me cry, and you know I hate to cry- Oh, now you’ve done it…”_

_“I dreamed of having my own family for so long. Since mom died, and then I thought, it might never be in the cards for me- skinny and frail and unlikely to survive the next winter. And Bucky, he was so good with the ladies! I never was, and I thought that maybe I could help him raise his kids, like be ‘Uncle Steve’. But then I grew twice as big, and three times as wide, and I had a chance. There was Peggy, and then there wasn’t. And now, there’s you. And you, and him or her, whatever they turn out to be. And you’re my wife. I just- I need to- I can’t...”_

_“We’re both blubbering messes! You’ve gotten so much better at the talking since we met, but Jesus, Steve! You’re so adorable when you get happy and emotional.”_

_“How else was I supposed to react?”_

_“Well, calm and happy, and okay with the fact that I might just have a nasty week-long stomach flu and some weight gain?”_

_“… You think I’ll get mad if you’re pregnant, and sad if you’re not?”_

*

She was pregnant, and they returned from their long honeymoon in London/help Jane pack her lab and ship it to NYC (a month long task with all the disorganization Ian had left her with.) to tell the rest of their friends and family. Then, Steve got a message on his special issued StarkPhone that Tony, _‘that stupid –ass_ ’ as Darcy called him, had taken on a terrorist organization on his own, giving them his damned home address. And by the time their seven-hour flight from Heathrow had landed, Tony Stark’s Malibu Mansion had been blown to bits, and Pepper was frantically searching for him.

As Darcy cooped up in Stark tower with Jane and Erik (who came for the labs now that their research was concluded and Thor had moved in there). She kept sending him videos and pictures of herself “third-wheeling,” as Jane and Thor shared space for the days he spent looking for Tony… only to find out that Tony was okay, and the person in real danger was Pepper.

*

_“Hey, Honey, how are you? Both of you?”_

_“We’re fine, Sweetie! Thank you. Just a bit tired and nauseous, though the last_ can’t be blamed entirely on morning sickness...”

_“Thor and Jane pretending to be magnets again?”_

_“Yeah, and like, I know we used to be like that, and will probably act like it when you get your ass back here. But for so many hours, after such a short separation? Even Erik is uncomfortable, and he walks around without pants on!”_

_“He gettin’ better?”_

_“Well, he refuses leave the penthouse. Says he likes being close to the place where he regained his control from Loki and helped destroy the machine he was forced to make. But yeah, I- I think he might be. He’s making progress anyway, more than he did in that nuthouse in London. It makes Jane happier too, so… Let’s just hope he can keep it up! I think Jarvis has been sneakily giving him therapy sessions, wait- yeah, I asked, and Jarvis neither confirmed nor denied it. So, he is definitely giving counselling to Erik. He must have gotten good at it after all the PTSD and paranoia Tony’s been struggling with. Speaking of, how is that stupid-ass?”_

_“He’s alright. Pepper got injected with some sort of exploding serum, and saved his stupid-ass with her new-found superpowers. Tony blew up his suits-“_

_“Yeah, I saw it on the news. Nice fireworks... that turned out to be like 50 suits or something!”_

_“He did it for Pepper, so she might get some peace and quiet.”_

_“Good, then she shouldn’t explode. I like her. I might have only met her once, but she did get me that last-minute wedding dress.”_

_“I liked that dress.”_

_“You should have thought about that before you basically tore it in two! Anyway, are you coming home then?”_

_“No. I got the great honor of helping Colonel Rhodes transport the President home to DC.”_

_“Ha! You sound so happy to serve.”_

_“I just find it really inconvenient that I have to travel all the way to the East coast to transport the guy home. Colonel Rhodes is perfectly qualified to do it by himself.”_

_“I’ll get Clint to take me back to DC with him when he visits Natasha tomorrow. I’ll see you when I get back.”_

_“Good. Can’t wait. I’ll make an appointment with your doctor. The one in London said we might find out the sex on the next scan!”_

_“Thanks, Babe, but I’ll do it. I know you hate making calls like that, and I have nothing to resent about getting to talk the ear off as many up stuck-people with ‘qualifications’ as possible.”_

_“Love you.”_

_“Hm, love you too- Oh, and please get me a selfie of you and the President, or make Rhodes take your pic while you fist-bump him!”_

_“I’m not gonna ‘fist-bump’ the President, Darcy!”_

_“But, you love me!”_

_“… Fine.”_

*

Steve sighed a second time, and took in the hospital room he was lying in again, trying to gather his thoughts. He’d left the extremely pregnant Darcy with Sam when Fury showed up in their apartment. Found out his friend had wings, and called in Thor for reinforcement as they took HYDRA on.

“My girls are safe with Thor, right? On Clint’s farm?”

Sam paused. The hair on Steve’s neck instantly prickled, the tiredness leaving him and changing out for full adrenaline and bone-deep fear.

“Sam?”

“Darcy- she….”

“Yes?”

“She went missing. Taken from Thor, while he and Clint struggled against about 50 HYDRA agents outside of DC...”

“Where is she?!”

“She’s in New York, Steve, with Thor, Jane, and Erik. _She’s_ safe. She-“

“ _She_ is?” Steve frowned at the choice of words. “And the baby?!”

Sam stared intently at Steve, begging him with his eyes to stay calm.

“She-Darcy- was only missing for a few hours. But, they, Steve, they took the baby from her.”

Ice filled Steve’s veins.

“Why?” he asked, his voice eerily calm in contrast to his raging mind.

“Our best guess? They figured the serum in your blood was passed on to your child, and intend to use her.” Sam voiced Steve’s fears. “The Triskelion Op had been go for months Steve, they stalled it until the baby was big enough, this was always a part of their plan.”

Machines were beeping, and nurses and doctors started crowding him as he ripped out his drips and removed the monitor wires and sat up. Not even as they were all pushing him back down into the bed did he so much as stagger, bullet wounds and battering be damned, he had to get up.

HYDRA had his daughter.

“I need you to get Tony on the phone, get me a jet from DC to New York in six hours. Tell him to assemble the Avengers,” he barked, in full Captain America mode, and started getting dressed in the sweats, t-shirt, and hoodie that Sam had brought for him. It took two tries to get into the sweats as he felt faint and nearly lost his balance twice. He grabbed the granola bars Sam had packed with the clothes, hoping that eating would make him stronger. He needed to be strong for the next few hours, weeks, months... however long it would take for him to have his daughter back and well.

“Take me to the where Darcy was taken, and then to where she was found.”

Six hours later, Steve was exhausted... mentally and emotionally... on top of the physical strain his injuries put on him. Even though Sam had assured him that the Avengers had been assembled since Darcy went missing, and that Steve really should be resting, Steve thought that the three days he had been sleeping was more than enough time wasted.

Darcy had been rescued two days ago, but nobody had found his daughter, yet.

Natasha, and Phil Coulson (who apparently was alive... not that Steve could bring himself to care at the moment) with his super hacker, had gone through all HYDRA files and sent Strike teams from what little remained of SHIELD to HYDRA bases. In the first, they found Darcy, cut open and left to die... but not the baby.

They had also reached a base, not too far away, where they found traces of DNA that matched both Darcy and Steve. Most thought, though they dared not say it, that the baby was dead and disposed of, but there was not a trace of blood or a body, not one small enough to belong to a new-born.

The other theory, that Steve both hoped for and dreaded, was that they would keep her alive until she was old enough to either be a super-soldier like Bucky, or could provide HYDRA with blood whenever they needed it from her.

The thought of HYDRA raising his and Darcy’s daughter, of her growing up not knowing her real parents, or what HYDRA really was, of Darcy’s face when he saw her again... knowing this would have never happened if Darcy had never met him, only served to fuel his self-hatred.

The memory of Darcy’s teasing quip on their honeymoon was tarnished by the horrors that had come to be.

*

_“There is a smiling face on this, that means it’s positive… right?”_

_“Oh my God! I am preggers!”_

_“Fuck.”_

_“Not that I don’t encourage your cursing, but this is not really the time!”_

_“No, Darcy. I just, I can’t believe it.”_

_“Well neither can I. I’ve been poppin’ those birth control pills for a good many years now, and never have I gotten knocked up before!”_

_“But they’re not 100% reliable. This happens, doesn’t it?_

_“Well, yes, but not to me!”_

_“But, you want it, right?”_

_“I-yes. I didn’t really think about having kids yet, but yes, I really do want them.”_

_“Good, me too.”_

_“I’m still blaming your super-serum-sperm for this!”_

*

When he finally landed on the roof of Stark’s big ugly tower, he assured himself that this was it. He would not bring any more harm to Darcy, ever again.

In the elevator, he devised his plan. Check on his wife, explain why she was better off without him, and leave her. And then, continue searching for their daughter until he found her... dead or alive.

“Darcy,” Steve called as the elevator finally opened to the Avenger’s own hospital floor, rounding the corner to his wife’s room in seconds.

“Steve,” she whimpered, looking up from her startlingly flat stomach.

She looked so small in the big hospital bed, eyes wide and wet, and skin pale. She had obviously not eaten anything the past few days, and judging by all the monitors and drips she was hooked up to, it was a miracle that she was even awake.

His resolve from the elevator evaporated as she reached for him, and within moments, he had her in his arms, clutching carefully around her shoulders and feeling yet another wave of pain in his chest at how close she managed to crawl up to him, when her stomach was not in the way.

And as the news settled over him with the harsh reality of physical evidence, added to the pain Darcy must be feeling, having had their child literally ripped away from her, he finally lost ~~to~~ the battle against tears.

“They took her!” Darcy gasped into his chest over and over, as if saying it would make it less true, like when you repeated a word until it stopped sounding like a word.

 “They took her! They took her! They took her!”

So, they stayed there, in each other’s arms, with her sobbing loudly in contrast to his silent crying. Darcy finally fell asleep, mumbling “she doesn’t even have a name yet,” as her eyes closed, and her grip on Steve slackened.

 

 


	2. living in darkness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for all your comments! Seeing your pain brings me pleasure... as in I managed write a believable heart wrecking story, which was what I set out to do. I am so sorry though, please remember that it always gets worse before it gets better!

It took two weeks.

Two weeks, before Phil Coulson approached them in the living room of Stark Tower.

Two weeks of intense hacking, searching and fighting... before what little remained of SHIELD had no more information to go through, or hack into. Two weeks, before he essentially told them that their daughter was gone.

“Fuck off!” Darcy told Coulson, “I’m not giving up, until she’s either here... or confirmed d-dead.”

Steve reached over the maps and files spread over their table, and gripped her hand. Her right hand, seeing as for the past two weeks she had barely let her left hand leave her flat and scarred abdomen.

Coulson nodded curtly, and hesitated, as if he wanted to say something else, before he turned and left.

Steve looked at his wife, as she closed her eyes and gathered her strength. With a shuddering breath, she opened them again, and focused anew on the theories they had so far.

“We _will_ find her,” he promised her, squeezing her hand. She looked up at him, and gave him a wan smile. It was there for a second, before she slipped her hand out of his and focused on the table.

He sighed, and joined her... knowing the scars on her abdomen were nowhere near as painful as the scars in her mind.

Once again, he wondered what would have happened had he never met Darcy... quickly pushing the thought of leaving her out of his mind. Sam was right, leaving her would solve nothing, thank God.

He had never needed Darcy more than he needed her now.

*

_“Don’t you dare leave her!”_

_“What?”_

_“Darcy. Your wife. She needs you.”_

_“I’m not leaving her, Sam.”_

_“No, but you’ve thought about it. Don’t deny it.”_

_“Fine, I have. I’m not good for her, Sam.”_

_“Not with that attitude, at least.  Oh, stop glaring! It’s only been a week. She is deeply traumatized. Her child is missing, and her husband barely talks to her. Not to mention that she is still in physical pain, she acts like she’s not, but we both know she is. What’s happened, has happened. You can’t change the past, and I promise you, her being safe in the future will do nothing for her now.”_

_“Maybe not, but it will make her safe in the future.”_

_“Steve, I know you’re not stupid... but, you really make me doubt it sometimes.”_

_“What?”_

_“She is too involved. Just think it through. You leave her? Fine. She will have to suffer more heartbreak, but let’s imagine she will get over it, someday. But, do you really plan on isolating her from Thor, too? And Jane? And me? Throwing her out of the targeted Stark tower? She can’t return to DC, because HYDRA will find her. She can go into hiding, but none of the Avengers can go into hiding with her, seeing as you won’t want them to when HYDRA targets them, too. What is your end plan here, Steve?”_

_“I- um, well-“_

_“Thought as much. Now, suck it up! You have every right to mope, and be sad and angry, but you need to be strong, for Darcy. You might have lost your daughter before you ever met her, but your wife lost her daughter while carrying her. She needs you, just as much as you need her.”_

*

He returned from the HYDRA safe house he had infiltrated in search of their daughter, sometime after dinner. He knew Darcy wouldn’t eat unless someone reminded her to, so he hated leaving her for long trips like this unless he had to. So, the odd sight of Jane feeding Darcy wasn’t unexpected. What was unexpected was the SHIELD agent standing in his doorway.

“Um, hi!” She waved timidly.

“Skye?”

“Oh, you remembered! Good. I just- I wanted to talk to you, both of you.”

Hope swelled in his chest, but he quickly killed it, knowing this was not going to be the good news they sorely wanted.

“Come in,” he opened the door wider, and closed it behind her as Skye walked into their living room.

Darcy pushed her dinner, barely touched, away from her. Jane only sighed as she took it to the kitchen, giving them some space.

Skye pulled a little gadget out of her pocket, and placed it on the table in front of them.

“This is all the information I have on HYDRA. Everything I was able to hack, and everything that was already leaked.”

Steve frowned. “We already have all this information,” Darcy voiced.

“Yeah, but, well,” Skye sighed, and started fiddling with the device until a small screen appeared. “I guess you’ve been a little busy, and probably not had the time to read SHIELD’s files on me.

“I have,” Darcy said, shrugging as the two others sent her a questioning glance. “I have a lot of spare time on my hands. I can only read the relevant files so many times, before I lose my mind. Filing and gathering information from files was my job for years, so…”

“Well, what my SHIELD files say is not true.”

Steve and Darcy exchanged glances. Skye continued fiddling with the device.

“My mother was taken by HYDRA for experimentation, but saved by Peggy Carter. Years later, the doctor was freed and they found my mother again, giving her to him.” She glanced up at them. Clearly this was a new development for her as well, and it was taking a toll for her to tell them. “She, well, she was special. She hadn’t aged a day, she was still young while the doctor was old. So, he took her, all of her. He- he took her blood, her organs, everything... and made himself young again, too.”

They blinked. Darcy looked a little skeptical. But Steve had doubled in size and survived in ice for 70 years, so he could easily accept this as the truth.

“In your file, it said that your parents were SHIELD agents that passed away,” Darcy interrupted.

“That was a lie to protect me. HYDRA took my mother. SHIELD took me. My father turned out to be a murdering psychopath. Anyway, as an orphan who was lied to most her life, but with a knack for computers, I made this.” She held up the device again, giving it to Steve.

“I had some help from Tony, okay a lot of help, but basically this is a device that will automatically snatch up any news relevant to finding your daughter, and process it.” She tapped through the different settings. “Since Coulson told us to focus on terminating HYDRA, I have worked hard on finishing this. Here, you can trace leads, and so on.”

She flipped the switch on the side of the device, turning the camera on, and pointing git at Darcy. The screen showed a faint red glow around his wife as she wiggled to try and see the monitor. Then Sky pointed it at Steve’s hand, and a faint blue glow emitted from his hand. “I worked hard on this, and programmed you two into it. See?” She pointed it at herself, and the screen remained black and white.

“It is basically a DNA camera. So, even if it takes twenty years, even if HYDRA did some serious plastic surgery to make her unrecognizable... you can point the camera at her, and she will glow red, blue, or purple.” He handed the device to Darcy to let her see for herself. And then, he looked at Skye with intense gratitude.

“Thank you so much Skye, for everything, for not giving up.”

She shrugged, and put her hands in her pockets.

“I did it as much for you as I did for myself. I might have found my parents, but I have worked most of my life on this idea. It felt good to complete it, and now I don’t need it anym-“

Darcy got up and hugged Skye before she finished her babbling. Steve smiled at the sight.

“Thank you,” he said again. This time Skye only nodded before she turned to leave.

“Just, one more thing...” she said as she reached the door. Steve looked up from the device as he went through its genius settings.

“You should give her a name. Take it from someone who chose her own. It is good to know that you have one.”

Darcy smiled, “we will.”

And Steve almost started crying, and his chest squeezed in realization that this was the first time in over a month that Darcy had smiled more than once in a day.

He hoped this new development would help her sleep better than she had recently.

*

_“You had another nightmare last night.”_

_“Yeah. I did.”_

_“And, you still won’t talk to me about them?”_

_“Oh, Steve! I know you blame yourself for what I went through. I don’t want to tell you everything in great detail.”_

_“Darce… I’m not going to leave you. Nothing can make me hate myself more than I love you.”_

_“That was both sweet and stupid.”_

_“I try… but Darcy, unless you talk to me about it, you need to talk to someone. Talk to Sam. As both he and you pointed out, PTSD is not something you can ignore until it goes away.”_

_“…”_

_“If not Sam, then someone else. Thor, Natasha, a shrink?”_

_“They’re called psychologists now.”_

_“I know. Just, please talk to someone.”_

_“Fine, I’ll talk to Sam tomorrow, but only if you promise to sleep. Stop staying up worrying! We are no good if none of us sleep.  How can we ever hope to find her when we can barely find the right file?”_

_“Fine. I love you.”_

_“Love you, too.”_

_*_

They named their daughter Sarah Louise Rogers. Darcy thought it was cute, seeing as she hadn’t taken Steve’s last name when they got married, and also had an unexplainable aversion to hyphenated last names, she declared it perfect. 

*

_“I’m taking your last name too. I’m changing it as we make her name official, but I refuse to let the Lewis name die!”_

_“So, you changed it to Louise?”_

_“Exactly, and you know the best part?”_

_“No?”_

_“Louise works well with the name Sarah.”_

_“Louise Sarah?”_

_“No, Sarah Louise. We will name her after the woman who raised you and the family who raised me, the people we loved, but lost too early…”_

_“Darcy-“_

_“I’m serious, Steve.”_

_“Sarah Louise Rogers?”_

_“Yeah, Sarah Louise Rogers… or Lulu for short.”_

_“Okay... That was a joke.”_

_“Sure.”_

*

Sam and Darcy were having one of their talks a few weeks after Lulu was named. It had been a slip of the tongue the first time Darcy had called her Lulu in all seriousness, and a few more slips by both of them. During a day out with Oliver, made it official, when he proclaimed that Lulu would be his best friend when she came home.

Darcy and Sophie only wrapped themselves closer around Sam on the couch, as Steve was giving Oliver a piggyback ride around the room.

Steve sat at the table with Skye’s device, when Natasha came into the room.

“I can hear you,” he said, not looking up.

“I wasn’t sneaking,” the ex-assassin replied as she sat down next to him.

He looked up, and found Natasha’s face blank and devoid of emotions, which mean that she was having a serious case of them.

“You okay?” he asked her, frowning.

“Yes. I just thought you might like to have this.” And with that, she produced a thick file in Russian. He kept frowning as he opened the file, and saw a Polaroid picture of Bucky in a metal casket with a window, frozen blue.

He looked up at Natasha, “Don’t you think I’ve got enough to look for?”

“Yes, but I know you want to find him too.”

“What are you not telling me?”

“I knew him.”

“He assassinated someone by shooting through you, and he shot you in DC.”

“No,” she flipped through the file until she came to a document, also in Russian and pointed to a word he saw repeated often on the page; _Яша_ “Yasha.”

“Is that what it means?”

“Yes.”

He looked at the three Russian letters again and then back to her, “and what does Yasha mean?”

She pointed to another word on the next page, _Наталия_ , on a list with the title _Программа Black Widow._ His eyes snapped back up to Natasha, thinking this must be some kind of joke.

“He trained me.”

Steve’s mouth went dry.

“Are you telling me that you knew my best friend survived in 1944, and you never told me?”

“Yes.”

He stood, grabbing the folder, and barely blinking at the sound of his chair hitting the floor.

“Why?!” he demanded.

“I had no reason to. I had not seen him since I was 17, and he wasn’t really Bucky. He was Yasha. He trained us for a couple of months. He taught me everything I needed to know to become what I am. He was my saviour, teaching me how to get away; he and Barton both saved me.” She stood up, too, not backing away from Steve’s intimidating scowl. “He was my first friend in years, and when they found out there was a connection between us, they pulled him out of training, and then they invited me to see him one last time. That time he was no longer Yasha, he was the Winter Soldier, and he didn’t know who I was. He had a cut on his forehead, and years later when I met him again that same cut was still healing. If he had recognised me other than from my Black Widow training and as a potential threat, it would have been but hours between the last time he saw me and that time. But, he did not recognise me. He shot through me and he left.”

Steve searched her face, and once again he did not find anything. Natasha clearly found what she wanted in his face though, as she lost some of her intensity, and stepped back.

“He was Bucky before he was Yasha, and he was Yasha before he was the Winter Soldier, I want to find Yasha, and you want to find Bucky. Hopefully, at least one of us will find what they are looking for.”

And with that, she left him in his apartment and with his thoughts.

*

Darcy had been slowly opening up to Steve about her kidnapping, and she slept better, had fewer nightmares. Sam was helping her, and Steve was glad. She was also accepting the fact that he would indeed never leave her; and that in turn got her to talk to him, too.

One night, after consoling her after a particularly nasty nightmare, she finally told him everything... everything from how she was feeling to what she was worried about, and what happened when they took her.

“I was so scared Steve, so fucking scared, and cold.” She wiped her face on his shirt as he brushed the hair out of her face. “I can only imagine how it was for you, freezing and not dying, after you crashed the plane, except... I was dying. I was cold, and empty, and dying... The last thoughts I had before I passed out were that I never even got to hold my child. I got to hear her cries, and I saw her through blurry vision, as the man said it was a pity that she was a girl, and then she was gone. I could never tell you how beautiful she was, covered in blood, screaming, purple-faced and slightly blurry, but so beautiful.

“But, then she was gone, and you were missing. My very last thought was ‘ _what if something happened to you_ ’? Because, then she would lose both parents... and I just can’t lose you, Steve. I can’t! I need you to stay with me no matter what. Okay?”

He nodded, teary too, and relieved that she felt the same. He was happy that he could be selfish and stay with her, because she wanted him to, too.

“I need you,” she whispered, looking him deep in the eyes and combing her fingers through his hair to see his face better. God! She was beautiful even when she was sad.

“I need you, too” he muttered back, and they met in the middle, lips slanting over lips, hands caressing under shirts and over bodies.

And that night, they made love for the first time since Sarah Louise was taken. That night they just focused on having each other.

*

“I talked to Natasha,” Darcy mentioned, as she entered their bedroom that night. It had been almost six months since Natasha and Steve had their talk about Bucky, five months since his relationship with Darcy had moved to calmer waters, and almost ten months since Sarah Louise was taken.

It was still too soon for Tony to suggest seeing the ‘Taken’ movie marathon, without thinking it through first, as Darcy made abundantly clear. That particular event also triggered their desire to move out of Avenger Tower.

Currently, they lived in an adequate apartment in Brooklyn, in one of the places that had been completely rebuilt after the Chitauri attack in 2012, funded by Stark. It was just as secure as the Tower, but without JARVIS (except an emergency protocol and Sarah Louise alerts). And it was their own space to just be _them_ for a while, going back into the motions of things. Darcy was working for a non-profit center with Sam that helped the people still affected by both the alien invasion and 9/11, and other issues that had bothered her since before they met, he remembered the spark she got whenever she became invested in issues, and was glad that some of the spark was coming back.

*

_“Seriously, Steve, do you have any idea how many people got asthma after 9/11?”_

_“No? I do know that it is a pain in the ass, though.”_

_“I thought it only affected the respiratory system… not the ass.”_

_“Haha! Very funny.”_

_“It was... don’t deny it!”_

_“You were ranting about your latest social justice blogging?”_

_“Oh yes, over a thousand people got asthma, and not all of them can afford the inhalers!”_

_“I Googled that after they woke me. It’s like $80 a piece, right?”_

_“Yeaaaaah about that... I know we’re recently married and what’s mine is yours, so, I hope you don’t mind that I kinda, sorta donated $40,000 to an organization that buys inhalers for people who can’t afford them?”_

_“Enough for 500 inhalers?”_

_“Yes?”_

_“We’ll donate another $40,000 tomorrow, then.”_

_“I love you!”_

_“I know.”_

_“Did- did you just_ Star Wars _me?”_

_“Yes.”_

_“Oh I’m so proud of you, Baby.”_

_“…Darcy, do you think our child is going to have asthma?”_

_“What?”_

_“Like I did, I mean you’re only a few weeks along... but I can’t help but think that the baby might be as sickly as I was as a child.”_

_“Luckily medicine has advanced and we can afford healthcare.”_

_“So, it won’t matter to you?”_

_“As long as it won’t matter to you when our child needs glasses... because I’m freakin’ blind without them.”_

_“I used to be color-blind.”_

_“Shut up! Really? No! You’re just pulling my leg here, right?”_

_“…”_

_“Steeeeeeve!”_

_“…”_

_“I’ll ask Jane to ask Jarvis!”_

*

“And, what did my work-wife and wife-wife talk about?”

Darcy laughed. She did that more often these days, and Steve was already starting to dread how she would probably stop laughing again, once they hit the anniversary of the kidnapping.

“Just... that it might be time for you to get your ass back in the field.”

“Darce-“ he started, but she held up her hands.

“Listen, I know we both want to focus on finding Lulu, but there is a bigger chance of you finding her when you are out there!” She gestured to the window and the great ‘ _out there’_ before she kicked off her jeans, and climbed into bed with him.

“And, plus, also- you might just find that some distraction from this fucked up situation and it might give you some peace. Yes, our daughter is out there somewhere. Yes, we should be looking 24/7, but it won’t really help.” She reached out and cradled his face in her hands, lightly massaging his brow with her thumbs until he stopped frowning. God! He loved it when she did that. It was such a Darcy thing to do.

“It’s not giving up,” she insisted, eyes staring intently into his. “We will _never_ give up. But we have to keep living. It could take years before we find her. We will go crazy if we do not distract ourselves from this, if only to have a minute here, or a second there, where we won’t be focusing on it.”

He nodded softly, and then closed his eyes as she kissed his forehead, wrapping his arms around her and just breathing her in. _Here. Safe. Home._

“I’ll talk to Natasha tomorrow,” he mumbled after a few minutes of holding his wife. “I think I know what mission I would like to start with.”

Darcy laughed... “thought you might say that. Natasha knows me and my powers of sane-talk.”

“Sane-talk?”

“Yes. The superpower I use to make Tony sleep, Jane eat, and, most recently; you get back into the field.”

He just laughed at her.

“Well, it worked! She also knows you, though!” Darcy pointed out, before she crawled out of bed, and found her handbag in the living room. She dug into it, throwing all sorts of ‘ _womanly necessities_ ” out of it, like lip gloss, tissues and… binoculars?

“Aha!” She retrieved a manila envelope with Natasha’s handwriting on it, and threw it on the bed next to him.

“You just read through that, and tell me if she’s wrong, after I get out of the shower.” And with that, she went into the bathroom, and left him with a handwritten translation of the Bucky/Yasha files.

“Natasha knows me well,” he shouted, before he got up to join his wife.

*

On the one-year anniversary of the kidnapping, Darcy only said ten words.

“Happy birthday, Lulu. We’ll always love you, wherever you are.”

Steve said nothing at all.

*

Three days after Peggy Carter’s funeral, Sam walked in on Steve beating his third boxing bag of the day.

“You’re in a rut.”

“No kidding,” Steve mumbled, as he hit the bag too hard, and sighed, as he got out the duct tape to avoid spilling too much sand on the gym floor.

“We have been everywhere, looking for Bucky, looking for Sarah, looking for HYDRA agents-“

“Yes, and so far we have only found HYDRA agents. Thank you, for that reminder.”

Sam sighed, and placed his hand on Steve’s shoulder. Steve resisted the urge to shrug it off, and focused on breathing calmly instead. It helped.

“That’s not my point, Steve.”

Steve’s shoulders relaxed a little, and he turned to face Sam.

“I’ve talked to Darcy. She’s noticed it, too, and I think I know what your problem really is.”

“It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out.”

“Not the obvious problems... no... but, here is what I think- It’s my fault.”

Steve blinked, twice.

“How on Earth is any of this your fault?”

“I told you, months ago, when Darcy was suffering from PTSD, nightmares, strong abandonment issues, as well as a severe case of postpartum depression... I asked you to suck it up.”

“And, I did,” Steve nodded, sitting down on the bench next to his towel and leaving enough room for Sam to sit next to him.

“Yes, you were great! You were an amazing husband, who helped his wife through the toughest time of her life. You went above and beyond for her.”

“Of course I did,” Steve frowned, wondering what Sam was getting at, and then shrugged “I love her.” Because there really was no more explanation needed.

“I know you do,” Sam smiled, “and you did the right thing, making her talk to me about things, waiting patiently as she dealt with her abandonment issues. You were amazing Steve, too amazing.”

Steve rolled his eyes. “How can someone be too amazing?”

“When someone supports their wife in her sorrow without dealing with his own sorrow.”

Steve looked at his friend, seeing the concern and sympathy there, the understanding that had made him gravitate towards him in the first place, years ago when he was just a jogger who shared his route.

“You both lost your daughter, Steve. At that time, it was Darcy who fell apart. It was Darcy that needed a firm, solid presence to be strong for her, so that she could pick up the pieces. And now, it’s your turn.”

As Sam said those last three words, Steve felt as if some of his tension and that stupid pressure on his chest that never really went away... started to lift a little.

“It’s like someone put an elastic band around my chest.” Steve started talking, blinking away tears, and trying to ignore how choked-off his voice was. He took a deep breath, and gestured as he spoke.

“And, when it came, it hurt, a lot. Then, something would happen, and another elastic added itself to the first one... and by the tenth elastic, you kinda stop noticing, start accepting that it’s always a little tight.” He tapped his sternum, and cleared his throat before he continued, “and I have so many elastics here, that whenever something good happens, whenever Darcy laughs or smiles, or a day was just a little brighter and the elastics break? There are always too many left, and I have- I have to let them stay or else I’ll fall apart.” Tears were falling, as Steve finished, removing the metaphorical elastics, as he leaned his arms on his knees, and covered his face with his hands.

“Shhh, Steve! It’s alright. Let it all out. Fall apart. It’s okay. A lot of shit has happened to you, and you need to feel it before you can move on. It’s okay.”

And Sam repeated those words, over and over, as he rubbed Steve’s back, “It’s okay. It’s okay. It’s okay. It’s okay. It’s okay to feel, Steve,” and Steve cried, and did just as he said. He felt, and he fell. And he let Sam cut all his elastic with his reassuring words and encouraging pats.

And, after his sobs had turned into hiccups, and his hiccups faded to the occasional shuddering breath, he finally lifted his head and looked up at one of his three best friends.

“Go home, Steve. Curl up into bed, and let Darcy hold you. When you are ready to pick up the pieces; we’ll both be here to help you.”

*

The second anniversary of the kidnapping was both better and worse.

It was better, because Steve and Darcy had both taken time to heal, to build and to live. It was better, because this year they managed to say more than ten words combined.

It was worse, because they still knew as little of the whereabouts of Sarah Louise as last year. It was worse, because all the progress that they had made the last year had taken a tiny step back. They faced the reality that they might never be able to find her.

“It will get better every year.  It will also get worse,” Darcy mumbled, as they stood by the little memorial Pepper had arranged the previous year. It was a beautiful monument, in Avenger’s Tower on one of the balconies, and it was made of metal and raised to eye-level, so as not to remind them of a gravestone.

“How will it get better?” He asked, as he wrapped his arms closer around her.

“It will get better, because we will get better. We will be stronger, and we won’t stop fighting, won’t stop looking.”

“We will never stop hoping,” he nodded.

“Yes.” Darcy leaned her head back onto his shoulder, wrapping her arms over his, so they both embraced her scarred abdomen.

“And, how will it get worse?”

“It will get worse, because it’s killing us that we don’t know anything. It will get worse, because we can’t stop looking, can’t just forget and move on.”

He hummed in agreement. And, together they stood there until sunset came and went, and Sam asked them if they wanted a ride home.

*

_“Darcy, what is your earliest memory?”_

_“Hm? What did you say?”_

_“Earliest memory?”_

_“I guess when I was three or four, and my dad let me sit in his lap as he tried to teach me how to tie my shoelaces, and my mum kept telling him that I wouldn’t learn that until I was at least six or seven.”_

_“...and how old were you when you learned to tie your shoes?”_

_“I was five.”_

_“Clever little girl, then.”_

_“Why are you so surprised? I was a child-wonder, and future genius, until the American educational system fucked me up.”_

_“You are still a wonder to me, if that helps.”_

_“And you are too adorable! Now, distract me with your earliest memory, before you make me blush.”_

_“But, I like it when you are the one blushing. I mean, we both agree that you look pretty in red. Right?”_

_“Steeeeve!”_

_“Fine, my earliest memory was when I was around three years old and my Ma took me to Central Park, she took me to see the artists paint and sketch portraits of people and then she had a portrait done of both of us, and I sat so still, because I knew it meant something special to Ma.”_

_“Aw, that was the only time you ever behaved. Wasn’t it?”_

_“Sometimes, I regret telling you stories of my juvenile rebellions.”_

_“Juvenile rebellions? When you took me to meet Peggy, she told me you never liked to play by the rules!”_

_“…Still don’t.”_

_“Thank God, for that!”_

_“Do you know what this means, though?”_

_“No, Husband. Please, do tell...”_

_“It means that our child will probably have her earliest memory from when she is three years old too.”_

_“Well, then. We’d better make 2017 the best year ever!”_

*

When the next anniversary came, the third one, everything had changed. After the whole Ultron deal, and the wreckage in NYC, they moved again, this time to Malibu, far away from everything, and conveniently into one of Tony Stark’s many mansions. Darcy had rolled her eyes as she had read “ _Avengers’ Mansion_ ” on the gate.  Darcy’s and Sam’s work was still focused on helping out in the rebuilding of NYC, after Avengers destroyed everything to beat the bad guys. Steve had told Stark point-blank that if he ever wished to give up this home address to terrorists, he would kill him before the terrorists could.

On the day itself... Darcy was angry. She barked. She yelled. She vigorously and furiously cleaned every nook and cranny, even though the cleaning staff had already cleaned it the day before.

And, it wasn’t until she started banging pots and pans in the kitchen, scaring away Clint, and making Jane emerge from Tony’s amazing lab to see if she could help, that Steve finally intervened.

“No, Steve, let go!” She yelled as she threw the kettle over his shoulder in blind rage, denting it, and breaking off the plastic handle as it hit the edge of the marble countertop.

He calmly embraced her, letting her hit him instead, and when her arms grew tired and punches weak, he let her go for long enough to pick her up and carry her to their bedroom where he tucked her in and spooned her as she raged on and on about how everything was wrong.

“- was only going to make some biscuits for Clint. Of course I trashed the kitchen and can’t cook like I promised everyone I would; now we will have to order pizza instead!”

Steve hummed into her hair as he burrowed his face into it, lips kissing her neck when they found it.

Darcy huffed, and sighed, and deflated, and then she huffed, sighed and deflated again. Steve only nuzzled her neck, shoulder, and hair as she calmed herself with her huffs and angry sighs.

After a while all the angry fight finally left her as she let exhaustion take over, “I’m sorry.”

“That’s okay. You didn’t hurt anybody, and in retrospect Clint’s face was hilarious.”

She snorted and flipped over to face him, wrapping her arms around his neck and smiling brightly at him.

“Oh my God... his face!” she exclaimed.

“I know, right?” He smiled back.

“I know you know I know… the – _um face_.” Her face fell as she confused herself with her childlike enthusiasm.

“…and this is your attempt at being smooth, right?”

“You, shut up!” she rolled her eyes, and smiled as she mockingly pushed him away, and flipped over again. He smiled, and tugged her close again, lips kissing her neck, a habit he had picked up last year when she had, after a drunk night out with Jane and Tony, come home with a badly-done tattoo of his shield there.

*

_“Isna’ funny! Is romantic!”_

_“Trust me, it will be funnier tomorrow, when you wake up and ask me why you have a bandage at the back of your neck.”_

_“Hashtag, YOLO!”_

_“Oh, how I wish I had a camera...”_

_“But, Steeeeeve!”_

_“Yeah, Honey?”_

_“I love you! And, Jane was_ so _like_ drunk _! And Tony’s whipped, so he couldn’t, but Jane wanted the hammer on her because she loves Thor.”_

_“Jane has a tattoo, too?”_

_“No, not a tutu,_ tah- _too.”_

 _“Yes, Jane has a tattoo –_ also _?”_

_“Mewmew, there!”_

_“…Doctor Foster has a tattoo of Mjolnir on her ass?”_

_“Yes. She was scared, and Tony said less pain on ass because- Steve, Tony has a playboy bun-ununny on his ass!”_

_“This is amazing. I love you, Darcy.”_

_“I love you, too!”_

_“I can’t wait to tell you this tomorrow.”_

*

The next day, he woke up on the sofa in the main room where he had fallen asleep under Darcy after the Pizza fest that Clint organized.

It was just him and Darcy, and someone, probably Bruce or Sam, had pulled a blanket around them. It was around ten in the morning, and he felt well rested. These Stark couches were amazing.

It wasn’t until noon that Darcy woke up... the anger burning her up, and making her sleep in for once.

“I know why I was so angry,” Darcy told him quietly as they returned to their rooms to get changed for a jog... a healthy habit they had started doing with Sam on Sunday evenings.

“Why?” he asked tentatively, knowing full well what day it had been yesterday.

“Because, she’s three now!” Darcy stopped changing as she was standing in her running shorts and ratty old training bra. In the sunlight that streamed through the window, he could see just how much the past three years had changed Darcy.

There was the big scar that ran from hip to hip, not angry and red as it used to be, but still stark against her pale skin. There was also the intricate web of scars on her right side, from when he had to throw her out the window to save her life when she was reckless enough to run around helping people evacuate while he fought Ultron. The glass shards had cut her from waist to shoulder to elbow, and the nurses had spent over an hour picking them out that night as he watched, refusing to leave... with the result that the doctors had to pull out an iron rod from his thigh while he was sitting on a chair next to her bed.

*

_“You were stupid and reckless tonight!”_

_“Right back at ya!”_

_“… Fine. I’m tired. Let’s fight when the glass is out of you, and I know you’re going to be okay.”_

_“Fine. Shit! You’d better get that out. Your thigh is already healing around it.”_

_“Oh, yeah. Well, when we’re patched up and yelled out, Tony promised us Shawarma.”_

_“Yum.”_

*

But the biggest change was her physique. Where she once had been plump and soft, there was now an edge, especially around this time of year. Now he could see some ribs, and her hipbone, and the way she hunched her shoulders and folded in on herself for comfort, the opposite of how she used to stand. ‘ _Plump and proud_ ’ she used to say, as she did the ‘ _Beyoncé pose_ ’.

“Sarah Louise is three.” She sighed as she sat on the bed next to him; and he abandoned the task of putting his sneakers on. “She’s three, Steve! Until now, whatever those Nazi head-growing motherfuckers did to her, at least she wouldn’t remember it.” Darcy’s head fell to his shoulder in defeat, and even though all they’d done all day was sleep, watch TV and eat... she looked even more exhausted than he felt.

“We’ll find her, and we’ll do it before she becomes a, I don’t know, ‘ _Winter Widow’_?” Darcy sighed, and slung her legs across his so she could curl up in his lap. He picked her up, and crawled backwards to the middle of the bed, laying them down and pulling the covers over them both.

“I’ll tell Sam he’s gonna have to jog with Nat instead.”

He could almost feel Darcy rolling her eyes as she answered, “don’t bother. Bro’s got some sort of sixth ‘ _the-Rogers-are_ - _feeling-stuff-now’_ sense.”

“True.”

*

It took three years, two months, one week, two days, and about five hours before Darcy and Steve finally received any news. They did so in the least-expected way possible.

“There has been a Barnes sighting.” Natasha explained as she stormed into their kitchen. Steve looked up to the multimedia touch screen they had in the living room as she started pulling up CCTV photos.

“You both better see this.”

He glanced over at Darcy, who had a spoonful of Cheerios half-way raised to her mouth, and back to Natasha, taking it in. He walked over to the screen, Darcy in tow, when Sam came in wearing full Falcon getup, with his Captain America Uniform in one hand, and Natasha’s Black Widow suit in the other.

“Did you tell them all of it, Babe?”

“Tell us what?” Darcy asked as Sam threw the black spandex at his girlfriend, and his uniform to him.

“Let them just see the video,” Natasha snapped, not even a fraction of Sam’s enthusiasm in her voice, clearly hinting that Sam should stop smiling.

The CCTV footage was reasonably good, and on it they saw a man, from the waist up, over the counter in a Post Office. He was wearing a jacket, and a baseball cap; and under it he had a long ponytail and beard. He was wearing a pair of sunglasses, and if it hadn’t been for the way he was holding himself, or the fact that Steve could see the light reflecting off metal fingertips, he would have never believed this was James Barnes.

But then he saw exactly why Sam was so excited.

“Pause. JARVIS, rewind one point three seconds.”

When Bucky had finished paying, he turned and picked up a toddler, roughly three years old, who was ripping a hat off her blond head and looked up at a point near the camera, before Bucky reached his arm out and pulled the hat back on.

Darcy gasped and clutched Steve’s arm so hard it almost hurt him. Steve asked JARVIS to zoom in on the face, automatically clearing it as much as possible.

“It’s her,” Darcy whispered in shock next to him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some of you saw this coming ;) 
> 
> ((also; notice the vague mentions of Ultron, I had no idea what to write about that, but in 3 years some world saving should happen. This is the Avengers after all.))
> 
> I would once again like to thank by amazing beta, not only for helping me spell shawarma but for her comments and encouragements. Thank you GlynnisIsta8! (yes that is her name on Ao3 now go and read "riding out the day's events")


	3. bright lights chase the darkness away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They can finally go get their Sarah Lulu back!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry, again, for the tardiness of this chapter. Life caught up with me, but now its finished.  
> It has been quite a journey, and I hope you all have had as much fun with this as I had (and by fun I mean occasional tears and a bucket of feels)  
> Once again thanks to Carrie who gave me this arse-kickin' prompt and loads of love to G for being a literal angel and a joy to work with. Her patience with my grammar is something to marvel at. This story would not have had the same quality without her help.

_It’s her._

Steve looked towards Darcy for the fifth time in as many minutes.

_It’s her. It’s her. It’s her._

Darcy’s words echo in his head on repeat, filling the happy bubble inside him that was just a little squeezed by elastic bands of doubt and fear.

What if it wasn’t her? Darcy had barely been conscious the last time she saw their baby, and Lulu had been a purple, bloody mess according to her.

The car hit a pothole, and he squeezed Darcy’s thigh reassuringly, meeting her hopeful eyes and looking away. He didn’t have the heart to tell her of his doubts and fears.

But, he had to soon. According to the GPS, they would arrive at the post office in less than 15 minutes.

He looked out the window, letting the way Darcy’s hand warmed his own calm him as he wondered the best way to broach the subject.

“What’s wrong?” Darcy asked him tentatively.

Head-on it was.

“Just, I don’t want you to be too shocked if we don’t find her. Okay?”

Darcy frowned in a way not too different from when she had introduced him to advanced-pop culture; _frustrated_.

“Look, Sweetie! No!“ She covered his mouth with a hand when he opened his mouth to interrupt her. “I know what you’re thinking. Hell! I’m thinking it too! But, we are one hundred percent sure that this,” she held up the device Skye had given them with Sarah Louise’s face staring back at him, “is our daughter. And this,” she zoomed out to show the man holding her, “is Bucky Barnes, your best friend and a war hero. Also, former HYDRA, so he has motive for taking her from them. And you said he remembered you, and dragged your self-sacrificing ass out of the Potomac. And, according to Nat, this guy...” She zoomed out once again to show the back of a man’s head as he handed Bucky a package over the counter. “This guy is Brian Johns, and he works _here_.” She switched to the GPS function and pointed to the red dot that was oh-so-close to their blue dot on the map. “Where, according to Jarvis, the CCTV got them less than two hours ago. They can’t have gone too far.”

She then folded her arms across her chest, and set her face in the most determined and unmovable scowl.

“This is the closest we’ve been in the past three years, so don’t you _dare_ take this happiness away from me, no matter how low I will get if this trail goes cold.”

And then she turned to face the front seat, meeting Sam’s eyes in the rear-view mirror as if daring him to make the same case.

He held up his hands in mock surrender. Steve frowned, thinking her words over, and then sighing, letting it go in favor of draping his arm around his wife and holding her close to his side.

Natasha cleared her throat after a few minutes, making them untangle and give her their undivided attention.

“We are going to be there in a few minutes,” she announced, glancing at them in the mirror before turning onto another dirt road.

“And, before we get there, you need to know that you are staying in the car.” She glanced at Darcy as she said this, making it clear. She did not want a civilian with clouded judgement, no enhancements and no wings meeting the Winter Soldier, no matter how many hours she had spent at the gym.

“But-“

“No.” Widow cut her off, because that was what she was now. Natasha was in full Black Widow mode. “You will stay in the car and wait while I infiltrate the area with the Captain. Falcon will take care of surveillance.”

Sam and Steve nodded, and Darcy looked put out. But, after one look at her husband’s face, she sighed, obviously knowing she would be out-voted if she protested.

“Fine!” She grumbled, and reached for the two bags in the seat next to her. “I’ll do tech backup.”

Natasha nodded, and slowed down as she approached the tiny town. “Good. Stark and JARVIS already hacked the few camera feeds in the area, but there haven’t been any sightings yet.”

Darcy nodded, visibly putout, and handed Sam the surveillance bag. She then unzipped the duffle bag and went through the contents for the fifth time since they got in the car.

Natasha parked the car in front of the post office, and got out the package they would mail as their cover.

Steve gave Darcy a quick kiss, and got out of the car to follow Natasha. They walked up to the post office. When he opened the door for Natasha, he stole a quick glance to the car in time to see Darcy climbing into the driver’s seat to better see Sam’s screens.

*

_“Sweetie? Have you seen my ski jacket?”_

_“You don’t ski. We live in Malibu.”_

_“I know.”_

_“Then, why do you need it? Why do you even have one?”_

_“I know you can’t see me, but I’m rolling my eyes at you through the closet door.”_

_“I think it’s in the hallway closet. Let me have a look.”_

_“Did you find it?!”_

_“Yeah! It was inside my ski jacket... Why are you packing?”_

_“Well, I thought, if we ever get a lead, we will have to go at a moment’s notice. So, I stitched up and packed your old stealth suit, some tee’s and sweaters and socks, loads of socks, and a pair of jeans. Oh, and guns! The ICER Simmons gave me when I complained about killing people to Jane in their lab! And normal guns, too, because my maternal instincts probably want something deadlier when we get those HYDRA bastards.”_

_“Honey…”_

_“I’m fine! It’s okay! Also, I have some snacks and whatnot... and that bulletproof vest Tony gave me that fits disturbingly well.”_

_“JARVIS took your measurements.”_

_“I know, but it’s still creepy!”_

_“How long have you planned on packing this bag?”_

_“Oh, I had one in New York City. But after someone destroyed the whole place, I decided to make a new one. And for all we know we might find a clue that takes us to north Russia or something. So... ski jacket. You can just wear that stealth suit under your ordinary clothes, but I can’t survive snow without my jacket.”_

_“Smart. Hold on one second.”_

_“What are you looking for?”_

_“This.”_

_“Is that the Spider-plushy Oliver got for Lulu last Christmas?”_

_“Yeah.”_

_“Sophie texted me last week and told me his new favorite superhero is Spiderman.”_

_“He’s a great kid…”_

_“… Oliver? Or Spiderboy Parker?”_

_“Both.”_

*

Natasha had barely started her smooth interrogation of Brian before Steve’s phone rang. Panic seized his chest when he saw Sam’s name on his screen.

“Yes?”

_“We just spotted him outside of... Darcy! What are you doing?!”_

Steve gripped the phone tighter; ignoring the creak in the plastic _Mr. Darcy_ cover that Darcy had thought was hilarious as an anniversary gift. With barely a signal to Natasha, he walked back to the door.

 “Put me on speaker.” He heard the beep that signalled Sam doing just that, as he saw their car pull out of the parking spot across the street. “Darcy, what the _hell_ are you doing?!” He opened the door, and gracefully avoided colliding with an old woman and her walker on the pavement outside.

_“Sam saw Bucky exit a store around the corner and enter a car that is driving past this street right the fuck now! What do you think I’m doing?!”_

Panicked, Steve started running, conscious of Natasha doing the same behind him, his hearing catching her Russian curses.

“Pull over! Now!” he shouted as images of Darcy going head to head with the Winter Soldier with her Taser and an ICER  flooded his mind.

“ _No!”_

“Damn it, Darcy!” He yelled again, not caring that people were staring as he sprinted at inhuman speed towards the big black car. “Sam! Do something!”

He heard a snort from Darcy.

_“I would if I could, but Darcy has her ICER pointed at me. If you want me to be her backup, I need to stay conscious, Cap.”_

Steve cursed, and removed the phone from his ear to avoid more futile screaming and to gain some speed as Darcy had to slow down for the turn. He cursed again when he remembered her driving lessons from Clint and Tony. Darcy merely skidded her back tires, twisting the car 90 **°** effortlessly before zooming on.

He sprinted, reaching the corner seconds later before his wife’s tinny voice reached his ears.

“ _STOP! We are trying to casually trail him. He’ll run if he sees Captain America running after him at 30 miles per hour!”_

Steve slowed to a human sprint, having to concede the point. He slowed to a jog as he reached the corner, turning to see how far behind Natasha was.

“Darcy…” He sighed, and put the phone back to his ear as he waited for Nat to catch up to him, wanting nothing more than to continue his mad dash after his mad wife.

“ _Sam’s sending you our GPS coordinates through the Skye-vice. Get a car and follow_.” Darcy relented.

“ _And I will keep you two updated. I’m putting us all on the comms as we speak.”_ Sam said calmly and hung up the phone. Steve glanced down and saw the map with Darcy’s red dot and his own blue dot slowly moving apart. He fished the comm out of the zipped pocket on his thigh as Natasha reached him, slightly out of breath and already wearing her com.

“If you had worn your comm from the beginning, I would have told you just how much of an idiot you were being, running like that.” Natasha grumbled in her disdainful tone.

Steve rolled his eyes at her, and turned his own comm on, listening to Darcy and Sam arguing about her driving skills.

“Let’s find some wheels,” he suggested.

“Done!” Natasha nodded to the motorcycle someone had just parked in front of the bar on the other side of the street.

“Okay, but we are only borrowing.” At least there was not a dashboard for her to put her feet on.

“Deal... as long as I get to drive,” she smiled devilishly.

“Deal.”

*

_“Steve?”_

_“Hm?”_

_“Are you asleep?”_

_“Yes.”_

_“Then wake up, Ass, I need to talk.”_

_“Hm… what about?”_

_“Anything. It’s two in the morning, and my head is so loud.”_

_“What’s it screaming about?”_

_“Everything. Why I did that embarrassing thing ten years ago... What I’m doing tomorrow... How HYDRA ruined my chances of ever having kids again._

_“Honey-“_

_“Whether we’ll ever find Lulu! What happens if we don’t? What happens if we do? I mean, Steve... What if we get her back, and I’m a horrible mom?! I’ve never had a kid! I barely managed to take care of myself until senior year of college!”_

_“Honey! Darcy... shhh...”_

_“Sorry. I’m just having one of those days again. Everything melted together, and **blah**! I can’t even distract myself by counting sheep without remembering how you complained about the field of sheep where Natasha dropped you in Scotland, when you visited me in London for the first time. And then I think of you, of us, of those amazing weeks... Then I think of Jane and Thor. And I think of us and Thor... and his face when HYDRA took me! Then I think about being pregnant. I think about not being pregnant. I think about never being pregnant again. And then... the last two-three years and- Steve, I just. Everything! And now I’m crying. I’m sorry.”_

_“Don’t! Honey, come here! You have nothing to be sorry about. None of this was your fault, and you are allowed to have these thoughts. I’m just glad that you are talking to me.”_

_“Ha! Good luck getting me to shut up!”_

_“Would never dream of it... Just, promise me you’ll never count sheep again, okay? Next time you can’t sleep, wake me up before your mind starts shouting. I’ll distract you, however you need me to.”_

_“Hm. If I wasn’t so tired, I would like the direction of this conversation.”_

_“I know you would.”_

_“Next time.”_

_“Alright. And, for the record... you’ll make an amazing mother.”_

_“Really?”_

_“Yeah. No matter how old she is when we find her, you’ll do great. You changed Oliver’s diapers when he was a kid. You take care of Jane like a mother hen, even after you ended the internship. And Sam told me loads of stories from your family traditions. How you fixed up Patty with Gary... how you brought soup to him that time he and Riley were sick even though you were just a kid in foster care. You take care of me. And, according to Bucky that’s a full time job. You are nurturing, kind, and warm. Not even HYDRA could take that away from you.”_

_“Thank you. I needed to hear that.”_

_“Anytime! Just wake me up. I’m more than a pretty face.”_

_“Yeah! You’re also nice abs and great pecs!”_

_“Oh, go to sleep!”_

_“Okay… Steve?”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“You know it goes for you too, right? Wake me up if you need to talk, or, you know, other distractions.”_

_“I might just do that.”_

*

When Steve parked the bike behind a copse of trees, he didn’t know what he expected to see.

The comms and GPS signals had been scrambled, so Natasha and Steve had traded places on the bike. He was driving, as she traced the scramble by seeing where signals fell out, and where they popped back in, and then directing him to the epicenter. It had caused them a minor delay, a couple of minutes, not too bad. But apparently, a lot could happen in six minutes.

Behind the trees, there was a clearing with a camper in the middle. The whole area looked like it had been a trailer park over a decade ago. There was only one camper there now, with whatever scrambled the signals on its roof. In front of the camper were two cars... a monster of a pickup truck, big enough to pull the camper, and their own big car.

Steve didn’t focus on their surroundings. Instead, he looked on in terror as Bucky stood between the camper and the car, two guns raised. One was pointing at Sam, who stood next to the car with his arms up in surrender. The other was aimed at Darcy, who was standing barely a few feet away from Bucky. She had one hand up in the air, mimicking Sam, and the other outstretched. She offered the Skye-vice to the Winter Soldier, as she edged closer and closer.

Steve almost jumped out to run and put himself between his wife and his best friend’s gun. Natasha tackled him swiftly and quietly to the ground, only managing because he was not focusing on anything other than the ever-shrinking space between the gun barrel and Darcy’s forehead.

“дурак,” Natasha whispered at him, so low that only serum enhanced ears less than three feet away could hear. He recognized the word as something she often whispered on missions whenever someone on their team did something foolish… which was a lot. “Jumping out would only spook him. Just _listen_.” She let him up, and they edged forwards again, standing with guns at the ready.

“I’m going to put this down on the ground now, and then I will turn around so that you can see that I am not armed,” Darcy calmly told the assassin three feet in front of her. “Then, I’m going to back away as slowly as I approached... back to where I started, and you can pick it up.” Steve was impressed with Darcy’s bravery, scared for her, but impressed all the same. He could see Bucky’s face looking less deadly and more cautious by the second. 

“Your wife is getting through to him,” Natasha observed, reaching the same conclusion. “We can shoot his hand with a Widow’s bite if he lowers the gun.”

“No. His fingers might seize and pull the trigger.”

“Stark improved the bites. He found schematics for the arm after HYDRA went public. The bite will make it limp instantly. Power off.”

Steve nodded.

“I’m turning around now. I’m going to shrug off my jacket so that you can see that I’m not hiding anything. I’m going to put my arms down for that. ” Darcy stated, clear and calm, gauging Bucky’s reaction before continuing. Nat looked very impressed by how well Darcy was handling the situation.

Jacket off, Darcy was wearing her gray long-sleeved tee and the skin-tight dark-red body armour that Stark had given her. It was clear that she did not have any hidden weapons in either that or her black jeans.

“Just doing one last turn to be safe...” she said, and turned again. As she had her back towards him, Steve could have sworn he saw Bucky’s face shift, showing amusement and exasperation. It was an expression he had used often with Steve, growing up.

Darcy finished her twirling, and started to back away slowly. It was too slow, in Steve’s opinion.

When she was standing a few feet in front of Sam, close enough for Bucky to watch them both at the same time, but not close enough to for them to reach him, Bucky picked up the Skye-vice... just as slowly.

After a full minute of silence, Bucky took his eyes off Sam and Darcy, and glanced at the screen, then back up at Darcy, waiting for her to explain what the device was.

“Point the camera at me,” Darcy patiently explained, and Bucky did so.

“Do you see the red color on me?” she asked, and he gave a miniscule nod. “Now, point it to the trailer,” Darcy said, for the first time her voice quavering.

Bucky hesitated, obviously not wanting to turn away.

“I promise we won’t do anything while you turn to the camper. We both know you’re good. We know you can kill us both easily, if we even think about moving. Right, Sam?” she asked her friend, without taking her eyes off Bucky.

“Damned right, Darce,” Sam answered without hesitation.

“See?” Darcy addressed Bucky again. “The only thing I will do when you point the camera at the camper, is to talk to you.”

It took another minute before Bucky slowly pointed the camera to the camper without looking, and Steve felt his heart beat in his ears because with the tiny screen now facing him, he could make out the even tinier purple spot on it.

She was there. Sarah Louise was in the camper. His daughter was alive.

Their daughter was alive.

For the first time in three years, two months, one week, two days, and about eight hours he let himself accept that getting his daughter back was more than a hope and a dream. It was a tangible possibility. It could come true today.

Steve was not the only one who had seen the purple spot. Darcy, who was much closer and at a better angle, gave an audible gasp... making Bucky whip his head back around before he had even looked at the screen.

She had lost some of her calm aura, and now looked vulnerable. Bucky cocked his head slightly to the side as he saw the change in her. Darcy glanced between the screen and Bucky’s quizzical face a few times before she took a deep breath and collected herself again. She looked visibly calmer as she addressed Bucky again in the same tone as before.

“Do you see the color on the screen? Do you see that purple?”

Bucky chanced a quick glance at the screen before he looked back at Darcy. More confused than before, he looked at the screen, bringing the camera back to Darcy. And then to the camper again, to the corner where Sarah Louise was hiding and emitting the faint purple glow through the wall.  He looked back to Darcy one last time.

His brow scrunched, and eyes narrowed, and he lowered the hand with the camera to gesture at his abdomen, nodding slightly to Darcy. She nodded, slowly unzipped her body armour all the way, and tugged her gray shirt up to show him her scars.

Bucky stared for a second before he accepted what Darcy was trying to tell him. 

And then, everything changed.

Within that slight smile and nod from Darcy, and the relieved sigh from Sam, Bucky dropped his gun... clutching at the Skye-vice with both hands. He clutched it to his chest in a way that Darcy often did after a long night of reviewing files.

And then, he cried.

Silent sobs heaved through him, as tears left his eyes. For a few seconds, the only thing that moved was the cold wind blowing the dust around them, and the heaving chest of the Winter Soldier. Then, without thinking, Darcy approached him, crossing the clearing and carefully putting a hand on his shoulder.

“дурак,” Steve muttered.

“Damned right,” Natasha nodded. They moved out of the clearing, careful but fast, with their hands up in surrender.

Bucky flinched away from Darcy like an abused animal, and in many ways that was what he was. But, the third time Darcy touched his shoulder, he let her. They ended up with him awkwardly crying onto her shoulder, arms limp at his sides and on his knees, as she held his shoulders loosely in her hands and crouched next to him.

Even Natasha and Steve’s presence did little to stop their embrace.

It wasn’t until he had calmed his breathing, that Bucky lifted his head and looked Darcy in the eye, carefully putting his flesh hand on her cheek and uttering his first words since Steve and Natasha arrived at the scene.

“Вымать”

Darcy glanced at Natasha for a translation, letting her eyes linger on Steve to reassure him that all was well.

“She is the mother.” Natasha confirmed.

Bucky glanced over Darcy’s shoulder at Natasha, frowning before realization dawned on him.

“Natalia?”

“Da.”

He smiled faintly, a childlike wonder coming over him, Natasha smiling back. Then, his eyes rested on Steve realization dawning on his face.

“You know me.”

Steve nodded, voice gruff with emotion, “Yeah. You’re Bucky. My friend.”

Bucky nodded slowly, “I know you too,” he said after a while.

Steve could hardly believe what he was hearing. Did this mean he would get both his daughter and his best friend back?

“That’s great, Buck,” he smiled.

Bucky just shook his head. “I’m not Bucky. I’m James, Yasha, Josh.” He looked pained for a second, like human interaction took a lot of effort.

“I do not remember you. Some memories, few.” He said after a while.

“Oh,” Steve less-than eloquently replied.

“She is like you. Strong. The jaw. The hair.” Bucky narrowed his eyes, cocking his head like he had when Darcy gasped minutes earlier. “The nose,” he continues, and Steve could see Bucky fighting a fond smile, “before you broke it.”

Steve felt his heart beat wildly in his ears again.

“Purple.” Bucky stated, and got back onto his feet. “Red,” he pointed at Darcy, who also started to get up. “Blue?” he looked at Steve. Steve nodded.

Bucky nodded too, “I guess I always knew,” he muttered, before he suddenly walked up to the camper and opened the door. The movements made everybody freeze.

Through the door, Steve could see a tiny kitchenette with a fridge. On it was a page out of the Captain America coloring book from the Smithsonian, the page where he, in full Captain America gear from the War, had his arm around Bucky Barnes. Blue and red crayon marks were outside all the lines, and the child had been aggressive with the brown crayon on Bucky’s head, making it resemble the long hair he had now.

Steve felt a warm tug in his heart as he walked closer, stopping when he came up by Darcy. He reached out a shaking hand to hold hers.

After the longest minute of Steve and Darcy’s life, Bucky emerged, a small blond child sitting on his arm, bashfully leaning her head on his shoulder, and clutching his jacket lapels.

“Lulu?” Darcy asked tentatively, more to him than to her. Steve suddenly realized that his daughter probably didn’t even know who Lulu was.

Bucky was mumbling reassuringly to her in Russian. Steve tore his eyes away from his daughter for a split second to look at Natasha, wanting to know what Bucky was saying. But, whatever he said made Natasha melt and bite her lip to stop from cooing, so Steve looked back at the beautiful child in Bucky’s arms.

Lulu looked at Darcy and Steve, back to Bucky, asked him a question, and he answered in English.

“Yes, Little Doll, they are your parents.”

Darcy nodded furiously next to Steve, squeezing his hand so hard that had he been his old frail self, she would have broken a finger or two.

She was probably crying, too. He didn’t look; too busy blinking tears out of his own eyes and staring at Sarah Louise to check on Darcy.

Bucky took a few steps closer, and, after a little coaxing, handed her to Darcy, who visibly had to restrain herself not to crush her daughter into a teary hug and never let go.

“Wow! How big you’ve grown!” Darcy marvelled.

“Still tiny,” Lulu said. “Strong, but small. Wait to train.” She spoke carefully to Darcy, before checking if she said that right with Bucky. He nodded, and she smiled a brilliant, toothy smile.

“You are so smart,” Darcy smiled back. “What is your name?”

“Yash calls me Little Doll.”

Bucky shrugged. “Her passport says Emma Smith. Didn’t feel right... naming her.”

“Yash said you give me name.”

Steve smiled, “we sure did, Little Doll. We named you Sarah Louise. Your name is Sarah Louise Rogers.”

She frowned, and wrinkled her nose. “Thas long.”

Darcy laughed, causing their daughter to un-srcunch her nose. “It is long, so sometimes I call you ‘ _Lulu_ ’ for short.”

The little girl thought about that for a long time, then turned back to Bucky.

“Yash! Lulu! I’m Lulu!” She smiled then laughed, “Lulu is better tha’ Em Em.” She nodded to Darcy, as if she approved.

Then, she smiled at Steve over Darcy’s shoulder.

“You are Steve,” she said. “Yash told me. I color you.”

Steve smiled back. “I saw. It was very good!”

“You are my dad. And you are my mama.” She looked between them with eyes so like Darcy’s that Steve’s heart felt like it would jump out of his chest at any moment.

“Yes, I’m Darcy. I’m your mama,” Darcy said through her tears.

Lulu frowned, and touched Darcy’s face, bringing it back and looking at the tears that now coated her hand. She then did the same to Steve with her other hand, and compared her wet hands with a puzzled pout that was just like Darcy’s. “Why you sad?” she then asked, looking up from her hands and visibly shrinking from them, as if fearing their tears might be signs of rejection.

“No! No, not at all!” Steve hurriedly assured her ~~e~~ , wiping away his tears and smiling. Darcy shook her head.

“No, Lulu. We are crying because we’re happy that we found you,” Darcy explained.

“Oh,” Lulu said, just as eloquently as her father when his assumptions were disproved. She even had his expression down to a T.

 After a few seconds and a glance back at Bucky – _Yash_ – Lulu smiled back at them.

“Then Lulu is happy!”

And then Darcy couldn’t refrain any longer and wrapped her arms around her daughter in a hug. It took a second before Lulu returned it, resting her head on Darcy’s shoulder, and closing her eyes as her little hands grabbed Darcy’s hair.

Steve lost his restraint as well, and embraced his family.

Finally whole, finally reunited.

 

 

**

 

 

In the beginning, it was hard for all parties involved. Bucky was present around the clock, sleeping in the room next to Lulu. Whenever she woke up in the middle of the night with a nightmare, she would go to Bucky instead of them. Though Steve had to admit it broke his heart a little each time, Bucky was the one who had been there for her from the start.

But, he wasn’t _Bucky_. He was James now. James Barnes to the Avengers, and the few SHIELD agents remaining called him Sergeant Barnes. Natasha and Sam called him Yasha. Steve’s two girls called him Yash.

Steve and Darcy took a few months’ leave from work. It was no problem for the both of them, but Steve soon assigned himself a new mission, “Assimilation of Josh Smith.” That was what all the fake documents and passports said James’ name was now.

Over the months that Lulu spent with them all, she learned to respond ~~ed~~ to _Lulu_ , _Sarah_ , and _Sarah Louise Rogers_ as easily as she responded to _Little Doll_ , and the occasional lovable ‘ _Tiny_ ’ from James and Tony. Like most children, she tried to ignore it when Darcy used her full name, because then she knew she was in trouble.

Darcy and James both blamed Steve for her ‘trolling’ and ‘punk-ness,’ and he had to admit that he often encouraged her not-so-innocent plans… But, he blamed Darcy for giving Lulu the lips and eyes to pull off the perfect pout, making it impossible for him to refuse her anything.

And she was brilliant at strategizing; Darcy had to admit, as she cleaned up her latest mess, “just like her dad!”

As Lulu relied less and less on James, Steve and Natasha used their spare time helping him regain his memory. Natasha had greater success than Steve. Yasha remembered almost everything about Natalia. Their sparring was the most graceful dance Steve had ever seen. They mixed ballet with lethal strikes in a beautiful dance that could only be achieved by two people who had trained and familiarized themselves with each other for years.

It should not have surprised Steve when Sam casually told him that he and Natasha had broken up. Steve came over with some of Darcy’s leftover pastries and a couple of beers that night after Lulu went to sleep.

“It’s alright,” Sam shrugged, washing down the Danish with the beer, then cringing at the combination of flavors. “I knew going in that I was not her one big love. We had fun. We shared good times and bad, and when she found the one that got away, well,” Sam shrugged again, looking over at Steve, “I’m not gonna be the reason why he gets away again.”

Steve smiled sadly, and clapped Sam on the shoulder.

“It’s okay to feel...” he reminded him, repeating the words Steve had sorely needed four years ago.

“Oh, shut up!” Sam laughed, shoving him playfully. “Nah, man. This breakup was the best for both of us. I love her, don’t get me wrong. It’s hard not to love Natasha, especially if she lets you inside her walls.” Steve nodded, knowing exactly what Sam was talking about. It also helped that Darcy had voiced these exact feelings a year ago.

“But, you’re not in love with her,” Steve finished for him.

“I used to be. In the beginning, I thought I fell out of love because she did after finding Yasha. But, hindsight is 20/20. I guess fell out of love with her a few months earlier. I just didn’t realize it until a few months later,” Sam laughed. Steve nodded, and stuffed another Danish into his mouth. They were delicious! He would have to ask Darcy to make more soon.

“Do you know how I realized I had fallen out of love with her?” Sam asked, after a few minutes of watching the basketball game.

“No?”

“Natasha told me about her feelings for Yasha, about how they never really went away, and she couldn’t pretend they had, now that he was getting better.”

“And?” Steve asked, thinking this was pretty obvious.

“And, I realized I was happy for her. I was not jealous at all. Okay a little bit, but I was more jealous when Tony made wings for Clint that were better than mine.”

Steve snorted, remembering how that project had literally crashed and burned.

“Well, then, to happy endings!” Steve held up his fourth Danish in a mock toast.

“And new beginnings...” Sam laughed, and tapped his Danish to Steve’s. Sam was still on his first.

*

A year after they brought Lulu home, James came to say goodbye. He had been living in his own little apartment in the mansion for a few months, approximately as long as it had taken him to into his feelings, and accept Natasha. But he still made a point of visiting Lulu every day.

“It was us against the world for over three years. I taught her to walk, to talk... that metallic arms don’t like porridge in the gears, and I almost finished potty-training her before you two took over the reins. I love her like she is my own. And, I will always be her Uncle Yash... But she’s yours, and I have to deal with that.”

He held up a hand at their protests, “I’m serious. She will always have me. But, she has you now... two loving parents who never make her hide for hours with a coloring book, some crayons and a flashlight because Uncle Yash has to remove threats and check that the coast is clear. And you don’t have days where you almost drop her because your robot arm is malfunctioning!”

He sighed, and Steve remembered the day James sat them down, and told them the whole story... from when he found and rescued the baby from HYDRA, until the day he broke down in Darcy’s arms, relieved that he didn’t have sole responsibility for Lulu’s future, and heartbroken that she was going to be taken away from him forever.

Steve remembered Darcy comforting James, reassuring him that the few bumps in the road were nothing compared to what HYDRA put them both through, and what he had saved Lulu from.

Darcy didn’t even pause, her response to his self-blame automatic and efficient. It was the quality that first made Steve fall in love with her... her assuredness when it came to him, her belief that he deserved the moon. Darcy had the ability to see the goodness in everyone, whether they were PTSD-ridden veterans with survivor’s guilt, runaways from the circus, or ex-KGB assassins.

“You know we don’t blame you for anything, right?  We’re just happy that you kept her safe and brought her to us.”

“I didn’t bring her to you,” James frowned, searching Darcy’s face.

Darcy rolled her eyes, “Yes you did! We might have found you because your camper needed spare parts, and you happened to be caught on camera at the post office, but it was still you who went into that trailer and came out with her, told her who we were, and handed her over. You raised her like your own, but refused to name her. You told her she had us, that we would meet again. And in my book, that’s the same thing.”

Steve smiled. He loved it when Darcy was ferocious, especially since it usually meant that she was standing up for her loved ones.

Steve and Darcy let James say goodbye to Lulu in private, knowing they would chat away in Russian anyway. Fifteen minutes later, James came out with an exhausted and teary Lulu in his arms, looking on the verge of tears himself.

Lulu was so emotionally drained that she only put up a small token protest when James transferred her to Darcy’s arms.

“Bye, Yash,” Darcy smiled, and kissed his cheek. “Tell Nat to bring you back to us in one piece, wherever you two are going.”

“I will.”

“Good. Come on Lulu, let’s cuddle and watch Ice Age in mama and dad’s bed.” Lulu nodded, sniffed, and rubbed her face on Tash, the spider-plushy she had named after Natasha, as Darcy carried her up the stairs to the bedrooms.

“Я люблю тебя Яша,” she mumbled.

“I love you, too,” James smiled back.

After a minute of silence, and then a minute of listening to the squirrel trying to get that nut out of the ice, Steve turned back to James.

“Where are you going?”

“I need to find answers. It’s more the journey than the destination, really. Gonna start with what’s left of Brooklyn, and work my way around from there. And I’ll take out as many HYDRA heads as possible, hopefully too many to replace.”

“Sounds like a great plan,” Steve agreed, knowing James needed to do this, needed to properly rediscover himself. Like Sam always said; _we all need to fall apart, before we can put ourselves back together._ Now, it was James’ turn.

James smiled a last time before he left. Steve followed him out the door.

“Just, one thing... you never told me...” Steve reached out to James, grasping his shoulder like Bucky used to do when he was the taller man.

“Why did you take care of Lulu?”

James looked confused. “I told you. I went into the HYDRA base that gave me the arm to find out how to fix it myself. After I killed all the HYDRA bastards I came across, there was a defenseless babe laying in a hospital crib next to my _chair.”_ He shuddered, “the thought of someone else going in that chair triggered a destructive frenzy. When the chair was in pieces, the noise had woken her up. She sure has a set of lungs on her! I couldn’t very well leave her there.”

Steve squeezed his shoulder, but didn’t let go. “That wasn’t what I meant. Why didn’t you drop her off at a police station, an orphanage in Europe, on the doorstep of some loving parents wanting to adopt? Hell! Why didn’t you bring her to me, if you suspected I might be her father?”

James frowned, thinking it over for a long time before answering.

“She was a tiny little thing. Frail, and barely covered by a little hospital towel... But she was still fighting, screaming, almost indignant, as if she would have up and left without help, if I’d come any later. I guess she reminded me of you... of that skinny kid from Brooklyn, with bruises, no meat on his bones, and always weak with some sickness or other, but always with so much fight and fury. I just felt this need to protect her, to back her up, to assure her that ‘ _you could tell them off without me, but sometimes you are gonna need my help_.’ Tiny, but strong.”

James smiled at him, a little teary.

“I didn’t remember you all that well, but I remembered that. When the Winter Soldier beat you up over the Potomac, I just kept seeing your battered face, and all the times I stopped a fist trying to strike you. And I remembered that I just left you on the bank after we fell in, where anyone could have gotten you. It wasn’t until the whole deal with Ultron went down that I realized you were still alive and with the good guys. That was when we trekked out of Asia and back into the States.”

James hesitated for a second. “I also have to admit that I was terrified of having to give her up.”

Steve understood completely. It was bad enough losing his daughter before he even met her, he couldn’t imagine how hard it must have been for James to give her back, especially when he had no idea whether they would take him with them or not.

In lieu of answering with a lump in his throat, Steve embraced his oldest friend and brother.

“She’s asleep,” Darcy said, and Steve turned to see her behind him. Lulu had obviously fallen asleep before the squirrel broke the ice. “Now give me a proper hug, too!”

She spread her arms, and James rolled his eyes with exasperated fondness, and let Darcy wrap him up in her arms.

“Tiny, but strong,” James joked, winking to Steve over Darcy’s head as she squeezed him a little tighter. “Just like Lulu.”

 “Oh, please,” Darcy rolled her eyes, before she let go of him. “I’m not tiny; I’m three inches taller than the future Queen of Åsgard!”

Both Brooklyn boys laughed, drowning out her indignant huff.

“I tasered a God, you guys!”

*

_“Darcy, are you awake?”_

_“No.”_

_“Then, wake up!”_

_“No.”_

_“Come on... I need to tell you something.”_

_“Argh, fine.”_

_“Daaaarcy!”_

_“Okay, fine. I’m awake. My eyes are open.”_

_“Good. You told me to wake you up if I ever needed to talk, or other distractions…”_

_“This better not be other distractions. I passed out after midnight, exhausted from such distractions, and that wasn’t even an hour ago. I need to recharge, Steve. I’m only human! I need this sleep!”_

_“Well, this is not about other distractions…”_

_“Okay… then what.”_

_“I’m happy.”_

_“Yeah, me too… I was also going to be happy when the sun is up.”_

_“No, I am extremely happy. As in, I am overwhelmed with happiness in this moment.”_

_“Valentine’s Day is officially over. Stop being so romantic, Mr. Darcy.”_

_“My daughter is settling well into the second grade, being a normal seven-year-old, despite my fears that she would either inherit my sickliness or super serum burden.”_

_“A ripped beefcake of a seven-year-old in a pink dress and pigtails would be a burden... yeah.”_

_“Oh, hush! I’m not done!”_

_“Go on, Sweetie.”_

_“Well, our daughter is doing great. There hasn’t been any HYDRA activity in almost three years. There hasn’t been any alien nor AI invasions either.  And, miracles of miracles, my beautiful wife is pregnant again!”_

_“It wasn’t really that much of a miracle, Sweetie. It took two operations to fix what HYDRA fucked up in there, and that super-serum-sperm of yours probably played a big part, too. Now, I have to suffer 24/7 monitoring by you, JARVIS, Sam and, because Yash can’t keep his mouth shut when Lu turns on her doe eyes, my seven-year-old daughter.”_

_“It’s still a miracle! Consider where we were seven years ago!”_

_“Fine, yes, it is a miracle of miracles!”_

_“Good, we are in agreement.”_

_“You’re such a dork!”_

_“But, you love me.”_

_“Hell yeah! I do!”_

_“Good, because I love you, too.”_

_“Steve, Sweetie?”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“I love you extra much when you wait until morning to have these cute conversations with me.”_

_**_

**_The End_ **

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so much for sticking with this, I hope you're all happy with the ending!!
> 
> As a little reward for your patience, I'm going to post an alternative scene. A lot of the conversations I have as flashbacks peppered in here are written multiple times, and this was one of the conversations I had a hard time choosing between, so have some Steve/Darcy banter!
> 
> “Done!”  
> “Uh, are we going somewhere, Honey?”  
> “No.”  
> “Then what’s with the bag?”  
> “It’s so that we can leave at a moment’s notice.”  
> “What’s in it?”  
> “Just some extra underwear, a little cash, basic toiletries, my warmest sweater, one of your old tactical suits, the one that doesn’t scream ‘Captain America’ and snack bars, because you are always hungry.”  
> “You should add this.”  
> “Is that...?”  
> “Yeah, It’s the teddy bear Oliver bought for Lulu.”  
> “I can’t believe you took him to a toy shop and he dragged you to the Avenger’s section just to pick out a teddy for our daughter.”  
> “I can’t believe he dragged Captain America into a toy shop to buy a Thor teddy bear.”  
> “I can’t believe we missed the opportunity to make Thor the literal God-Father.”  
> “I can't believe Jane and Thor are getting married next year and she will actually become the Literal-God-Mother.”  
> “I can’t believe the future queen of Åsgard has a tattoo of Mewmew on her ass!”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to my amazing beta for her patience and quick, brutal but kind betaing!  
> You should check out her writing http://archiveofourown.org/users/GlynnisIsta8/pseuds/GlynnisIsta8


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